


Earth's Secret Places

by charybdean



Series: A Series of Monsters and Scourges [1]
Category: Fate/stay night (Visual Novel)
Genre: Birthing Fetish, Blood and Gore, Cannibalism, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Giant Spiders, Gore, Inflation, Monsters, Oviposition, Sex Pollen, Vore
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-12
Updated: 2016-02-12
Packaged: 2018-05-19 19:58:35
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,786
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5979328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/charybdean/pseuds/charybdean
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In a future iteration of the Grail War, Archer and Saber fight again. But a new Caster has a terrible surprise in store for them, a terrifying one that they'll have to face together. Heed the warnings in the tags.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Earth's Secret Places

_one_  
There will always be another war for the grail.

A long time ago, in Fuyuki City, the Greater Grail was destroyed. But it's in humanity's nature to wish for impossible things, and certain motifs are carved into all our souls. Even when one door is destroyed, the tournament finds a window for its purpose. Perhaps it's in the West. Perhaps it's on the moon. Perhaps it's scattered throughout time.

Many years later, the Holy Grail War returns to Fuyuki City, bringing familiar faces with it.

_two_  
There will always be participants in the war for the grail.

In this age of technology and commodity, the magi who participate in the Holy Grail War see their Servants as little more than weapons. They think of the stories they are invoking as little more than books of statistics.

When Saber and Archer meet again in battle in the place where Ryuudou Temple stood of old, they show their Masters no sign that they share a connection. Maybe something flickers in Saber's eyes. Maybe Archer smirks a little, bitterly as always.

"Will you give this battle your all, Saber?" he asks.

"I will fulfill my vow to my Master," she says, and her Master is satisfied, not knowing the double meaning that's so apparent to the spirit who became of the man who became of Saber's second Master, so long ago.

When Archer laughs and says, "I was afraid of that," he doesn't sound afraid at all, so his Master is satisfied, not knowing the complex welter of emotions that lie beneath the surface of the Servant's disdain.

_three_  
There will always be villains to disrupt the war for the grail.

The Masters of Saber and Archer never liked each other, even before the start of the war, and the Master of Caster took advantage of that. In secret she offered an alliance to each of them, promising to help each one defeat the other if only they'd follow her instructions.

Instead, she leads them both into her Servant's trap. They should have known better than to trust a Caster or her Master, so don't spare any sympathy for them, but what about their Servants, the king of knights and the knight in red we know so well?

* * *  
What should have been a destined fight ends abruptly, with the ground crumbling beneath them and something that clings dragging them both into the darkness beneath. Archer doesn't know what to think of that.

Is he grateful? Saber surely could have destroyed him—but he could tell from her face that she had no intention of doing so. Somehow, though his own memory of past grail wars is jumbled, she recalls being his Servant, and she foolishly refuses to give up her vows from that time.

But isn't that a shame? He has no purpose in being here and little affection for his Master and his desires, so it's fine if Saber destroys him. And yet she won't. It's maddening, in a way. There will always be a connection between the two of them, and she will always see that connection as a reason to protect him, when in fact it should be the opposite.

Troubled by these thoughts, Archer opens his eyes in the darkness to see nothing but a dull magical gleam nearby. He reinforces his eyes to sharpen them and looks again.

He's in a cavern—was there always a cavern beneath Ryuudou Temple? He can't recall anymore. Spiderwebs cover the walls and floor; he's tangled in one, unable to move. Nearby, he hears Saber stir in the same trap and make a noise of protest. So she's in the same situation he is. That's a pain.

More important is the source of that gleam of light: it's a pair of eyes. A pair of glittering, multifaceted eyes on the face of a woman—no, another Servant for sure. She sits at the center of the webs atop a chitinous abdomen, with four spindly, spidery legs emerging from that lower body and another four more arm-like appendages emerging from her otherwise human half above..

Archer sighs and speaks. "I don't intend to work with a Caster this time, so give it up."

Caster's laughter is more like a chittering sound. "Is that so? Don't worry, your intentions don't matter. She's the one I need." She scuttles forward and reaches out a long spider arm to caress Saber's face.

Archer turns in place to look at Saber, concealing his worry behind a calm expression. She's staring wide-eyed at Caster, drawing away from the touch as much as she can. But that isn't much; the webs hold her fast.

"Saber," he says, letting his voice become a taunt, "don't tell me you're undone by a little spider." If he's rude enough to her, she won't let herself be bogged down by the need to rescue him, he hopes—although he knows already that hope is in vain.

Saber opens her mouth to speak, but Caster cuts her off. "There's nothing little about this spider." It's true enough. On her arachnid abdomen, she stands taller than Archer himself normally would. She wears no clothing, he realizes. Her full breasts stand out on her chest, an incongruous mammalian reminder of her split nature.

Saber, though, has figured out what he's doing. "That's enough, Archer," she says. "What you say now doesn't matter. We will both defeat this—"

Caster doesn't much care for that line of talk, apparently, because the claw with which she was touching Saber's face suddenly moves like lightning down her body. With a glitter of magic, it slices through Saber's armor. A ghostly afterimage of threads unraveling glitters in midair, and then Saber is naked save for the spider-silk threads that bind her.

Saber stiffens, her own small breasts bouncing slightly on her chest, and glares at Caster. "What—?!"

"I wanted to see all of you," Caster says, sounding quite pleased with herself. "And you don't disappoint. I have grand plans for you, Saber. A beautiful Servant like yourself is meant for my purpose."

"Your purpose?" Archer speaks up again.

Caster clicks alien mouthparts together. "I have no need to tell _you_. You're just a sacrifice."

"How fitting," he says dryly. It does make sense, though, that Saber is the one that she wants. Isn't it always that way?

Caster continues, "Before I use you, Saber, I need to test you. I need to see you battle with all your might."

"Why did you interrupt us, then?" Saber demands, neglecting to mention that she had no intention of going all-out in that battle.

"With all your might," Caster repeats. "You'll need my encouragement to do that, both of you. Most Servants...hold back because of _honor_ , don't you know? But I have ways of dealing with that."

She scuttles off to the side a bit, and her forelimbs begin moving rapidly, knitting threads together. The sensation of great magecraft being performed shivers in the air.

Saber squirms a little against the webs holding her, struggling and failing to cover her bare body up. "What are you doing?"

"Behold the Noble Phantasm of Arachne," Caster declares. "The Woven Truth!"

She holds up the tapestry she has created, and Archer can't quite make out the design on it, but he feels himself getting dizzy. A surge of breathless energy races through his body.

"The same craft that brought me low in life now holds my greatest power," Caster continues. "I defeated Athena in our weaving contest with this same power, weaving a scene depicting the scandalous and brutal truth of the gods' nature. Now I weave depictions of the base instincts beneath all honor and nobility...and draw them out in the process."

"What do you hope to accomplish with this?!" Saber's voice is as strained as Archer feels. His head pulses and his heart hammers.

"Isn't it obvious?" Caster's tone is gloating. "I'm bringing out your base instincts of lust, hunger, and self-preservation. You and Archer will naturally fight, driven by these instincts. Perhaps you'll give in to your desires even further than that—you might ravish each other, or devour each other, but...!" She catches her breath, clearly excited by the thought. "The important thing is for Saber to prove she really is the strongest Servant, unbound by her foolish code of honor."

"I won't—" Saber begins, her words and breath rough but determined, but that's when Caster reaches out and slices them both free of the webs. They land on the silk-strewn ground.

Saber quickly rises to her feet, but Archer can't. He's too dizzy, too overwhelmed. He tries not to look at Saber's nakedness, tries not to think about his own sudden lust. "Saber, don't—"

It's too late. She's already racing to his side. He can hear her heart pounding, but still she reaches out to touch his shoulder. "Archer!"

He tries to sneer. It feels too weak an expression. "As usual, you're undone by your honorable intentions towards others, Saber. You won't accomplish your goal here if—if you—" He can't think. He's not looking at her, but he can't help but be aware of her naked body so close and the rapid sound of her breathing.

"Well, then," says Caster from somewhere nearby. "Won't you show me a fight?"

Archer manages to shake his head. "Caster...you're an idiot."

"What was that?!"

How does he remember to speak? Saber is naked and nearby. He closes his eyes, but that barely helps. "You said your Noble Phantasm brings out the base instincts of hunger, lust, and self-preservation. But I have no desire to preserve myself to start with. My basest instinct is a desire for self-destruction."

"Archer," Saber murmurs. "Even now?"

"Even now, Saber," he says. "You'll find me of no use, _Arachne_. I can hardly stand up to Saber when all I want is for her to tear me to pieces."

"It would be of no consequence in any case," Saber says, her voice lifting. "As I would not hurt him in such ignoble circumstances no matter what."

"What?" Caster is clearly taken aback by these revelations. "How can you resist...? And _why_? You're both Servants, manifested to fight and conquer each other!"

Archer laughs weakly. He knows what's coming next, as he feels Saber drawing herself proudly up next to him.

"A long time ago," she says, "I swore an oath to protect him." He casts a furtive glimpse at her legs and sees her body is shaking slightly. But her voice is strong. "As a knight, no matter how you debase me, I will not break my vow."

"Saber," Caster murmurs, her voice oddly pleased.

"You're being a fool," Archer says, but he's resigned.

"Rise, knight," Saber tells him, reaching out one slim hand. "We will fight her together."

Archer hesitates for a moment, but he can't turn away an offer like that from Saber of all people. He reaches for her hand, swallowing against all the dizzying feelings inside him, against the yearning to bury himself in her flesh and her sword in his.

And then Caster's laughter echoes in the cavern. A chitinous limb hooks around Saber's waist and drags her backward to the wall again, where more sticky silk twines around her arms and legs. She struggles reflexively, but only succeeds in looking more helpless and beautiful, her face flushed with rage and her breasts shivering.

"You didn't think this battle was the end of my goal, did you?" Caster says. "No, I merely needed to be certain Saber was worthy of my purposes, and with her strength of will just now she proved that better than any fight could have." She appears out of the shadows near Saber and makes her way across the web to hover just above her on the wall, clinging to the strands. There she reaches out a human hand to caress Saber's face.

"Caster," Saber says through gritted teeth, "allow me to fight you as a knight. I ask for no handicap, only an honorable battle—if I lose, you may do with me as you wish, but give me the chance, and let Archer go."

"That would rather spoil my plans," Caster says.

Archer forces down his dizzy feelings once more to say, "You haven't said what your plans are yet."

"I suppose there's no harm in saying it now," she says. She lowers her body down a little so that she can reach Saber's chest, and she cups a small breast in one hand and squeezes it. Saber shudders but says nothing. "I need the strongest magical body of all to incubate my brood."

"No," Saber says, roughly.

" _What_?" Archer says. "You're a Servant now, Arachne; reproduction isn't your concern!"

"How wrong," she says. "It's true I'll need the grail itself to become alive again myself, but I can at least release my children onto the world even if that fails." She sinks the rest of the way down to the ground, landing right in front of Saber.

This is his only chance. Archer pushes aside the overwhelming feelings that plague him, rises to his feet, summons his bow to his hands, and fires off a series of arrows at Arachne's human upper body.

Without even turning to look at him, she dodges aside so that the arrows bury themselves harmlessly in a web. "Did you think I wasn't aware of everything that happens in my lair, Archer?" she says.

"Ugh—" He's too dazed with the effects of her Noble Phantasm to pull himself together in time to stop her counterattack. He staggers and is already sinking back to his knees when he feels the silk winding stickily around his arms, dragging him back to the wall. He feels it suck up the magical energy that composes his weapons and armor, and they disappear into nothing. He is left helpless and naked as he watches Caster approach Saber again.

She's struggling, but still Caster tenderly touches her face, leans down to kiss her breasts. Archer shudders and tries to hide his own intense arousal, but it's impossible. "Saber..." He can't say that he's sorry for failing to save her from this. It's inadequate.

"Archer," she says, her voice strained. "We will still find a way—"

Caster shifts her position a little. Something reaches out from her abdomen, a tube-like projection, and taps lightly at Saber's thighs. She goes still again, her eyes wide, her face flushed, and he remembers that she's feeling the effects of the tapestry as well, though she's been able to deny them so far.

"Be calm," Caster says. "It will feel wonderful having my eggs inside you. You'll be so proud to help mother them."

Saber groans a little as she struggles to deny the pleasure rising up in her. Then it becomes a gasp as the ovipositor moves forward between her legs and slides inside of her, parting her cunt to plunge deep into her body.

"Don't—nn! Nnh—" She shudders and squirms against the thing pushing into her. "This body isn't— _ah_!"

Abruptly, her cries turn from horrified to agonized, a subtle but important distinction: the ovipositor forcing its way into her is now no longer merely disturbing her but also causing her physical pain. Archer reflexively renews his struggle against the web holding him, but all that happens is his head swims with the effort of it.

Caster laughs and strokes Saber's hair. "You have a precious face when you're in pain, Saber. I knew your body would be perfect for my eggs."

"Why...?" She breathes roughly against the pain.

"I'm entering your womb now," Caster says. "Did you think I'd be putting the eggs anywhere else?"

Saber groans again and squirms a little against the ovipositor as it opens her up inside. Despite the pain, the noises she makes are increasingly aroused. She continues to struggle, but gradually, her body's motions fall into a rhythm with Caster's attentions, until she's grinding helplessly against the thing too deep inside her, her hips thrusting and rocking her body upon it.

Caster leans forward and tenderly nuzzles Saber's cheek, her human hands squeezing her breasts. "You're ready," she says. "I shall lay my eggs in you now."

Saber starts to moan, and partway through the noise her voice pitches into a higher register in surprise and distress. "Ah—!"

"Do you feel it?" Caster says softly, still gently rubbing those small breasts. "Can you feel them settling in your belly and filling you up?"

Saber groans and tries once more to pitch her body forward and away from the ovipositor, but there's no escaping from the silk that binds her. "It's filling me up...Caster, stop. My body isn't—I am not meant for this!"

"On the contrary," Caster says, "you are the most powerful and beautiful Servant, and that's all that matters. You'll be the perfect mother to my brood."

"I can feel it," Saber confesses. "I feel so full of them already, and you've only just begun...they're so heavy, rolling around like this inside me. My womb cannot possibly fit all of them."

Caster laughs. "Your body will adapt, I assure you." She pets Saber's belly lightly. Archer can see now that it's just starting to swell outwards, the shape of the eggs barely visible beneath her flesh. An appalling fresh wave of desire sweeps through him at the sight of that distortion.

Saber moans and squirms again. As he watches, her abdomen continues to bulge outwards as the eggs fill it. He shudders himself and tries to adjust his position to hide it, but—

Caster laughs again. "Look at your companion, Saber. He's so aroused—he loves seeing you like this."

Saber grits her teeth. "You've bewitched us both," she says. "Our feelings right now are meaningless."

"Your feelings right now are your deepest desires," Caster reminds her. "You want to mother my children, and he wants to feed you and them."

"What?" Saber blinks, glancing between Caster and Archer.

He says nothing. He's too dazed to lie, and he has a feeling he knows where this is going.

"My brood will require sustenance," Caster says, "and you will be in no shape to go out and fetch it for them. Archer is here to be eaten, both when you begin to hunger and when they hatch. You can slake your lust on him first, of course."

Saber shudders. "No!"

But Archer himself can't suppress a moan of helpless lust.

Saber stares at him, as her belly continues to swell to greater and greater proportions. "Archer? You desire this?"

He struggles to piece together words. "As you say, she has bewitched us, Saber. I want it...I want you to consume me."

"It's natural," Caster reassures Saber. "Female spiders eat their mates."

Saber glares at her. "My knight's oath to him comes before any urges of my woman's body!"

Caster merely laughs and pats Saber's stomach. It's massive now, utterly filled with eggs and quite out of proportion to the rest of her petite body. "You'll see. I'm almost done with you for now."

Saber shifts and squirms again in desperation, struggling to adjust to the unnatural weight of her bulging belly that swells outward from her body. Her breasts have swollen slightly as well; they stand out plump and round on her small chest.

Archer groans again and strains against the silk holding him. He wants to stop what's happening, but it's far too late. Saber's body is already so distorted, and his own body responds to it with desire.

At last, Caster starts to draw away from Saber. Her ovipositor slowly slides out of her; Saber moans a little in mingled relief and fear. "It's heavy—I'm so full—"

Caster reaches down one more time and gently strokes Saber—her huge belly, her plump breasts, and finally her flushed face. "They'll hatch inside you and then crawl out. Make sure to take in enough sustenance for them—of course, you'll do that regardless. Your instincts will overpower you to be certain of it." With a last laugh, she skitters away into the darkness. "Bear my children well, Saber!"

The sticky silk finally releases the both of them as Archer feels Caster's power retreat into the distance. He stumbles to his feet and tries to follow after her, but his head is swimming so fiercely that he can't even remember how to dematerialize. The urges of his body keep him pinned to physical form.

With a rough gasp, he sinks back down to his knees and shifts his weight awkwardly. His cock is completely hard before him, pulsing almost painfully between his legs.

Saber, meanwhile, hasn't even managed to get up off her knees yet. She places both hands over her swollen stomach and groans. "Archer...we must—we must leave here. Before this spell takes me over completely."

"Takes you over completely?" He doesn't understand. Hasn't she been debased enough? How could it possibly get any worse?

But she shudders. "I feel my rage and despair rising in me. It's this enchantment she cast, that brings out the worst of our natures."

"Surely you don't have such a nature," he protests, too weakened by the spell in question and dazed by his lust to hold back his true opinion. "You're pure."

She laughs hoarsely and sinks forward onto her hands and knees. Slowly, she begins to pull herself across the ground towards him, her egg-filled abdomen dragging roughly against the stone as she moves. "I am a king, Archer. All kings have their dark sides."

He shudders now too. "Does it matter? I can do nothing now. I give myself over to you, Saber. Take me and use me as the king sees fit."

She approaches him and pushes herself back up to her knees with another moan, her eyes lowering and closing in despair. The swell of her breasts and her massive belly tremble as she moves. "You know not what a dangerous thing you say, Archer..."

"I know," he insists, lightheaded at the sight of her. The thought of Saber sinking her teeth deep into his body and nourishing herself on his flesh is almost more than he can bear right now.

When she opens her eyes again, they are deep gold. She reaches for him. "Then the king claims you to slake her lust and her rage."

"Saber...?" He doesn't know what to say at this change. He can only watch as she settles both hands on his shoulders and slowly pulls herself forward, until her slender legs are spread above his hips, her cunt poised above his cock, her huge belly pressed against the muscles of his abdomen.

"A meaningless name," she says. "It's merely a class. You might as well call me 'devourer' now. I have—" Her voice breaks a little as she looks down at him with that overwhelming hunger in her eyes. "I have to feed."

She begins to sink down. The head of his cock disappears inside her cunt with a small slick noise. He feels her walls close in around it, tight and hot, almost too narrow to take him even now. She breathes heavily as she struggles to pull him into her, slowly sliding herself down past the head of his cock until it's completely swallowed up. She pushes herself further, taking the shaft into her wet hole as well.

"No," he says. "This shouldn't—" It should be impossible. She's small and should not be able to consume him so thoroughly. But she keeps taking his cock into her, squeezing it hard inside her, until he feels its head push into her opened-up, full womb and rub against the sticky eggs inside her. They're jelly-like rather than hard, and things inside them squirm faintly against his cock.

She sighs in satisfaction. That noise, at last, is too much for him, and he shivers and falls back against the silk-strewn floor with a moan of his own.

Saber nods in approval and rests her palms against his chest. Though she is slight, there's formidable strength in those hands, and he knows he hasn't a prayer of getting up so long as she holds him down. She thrusts herself against him, and he feels her slick walls slide wetly up and down against the shaft of his cock. Deeper within her, the eggs jostle against him as well.

She shifts position a little, but no matter what she does, her stomach still bulges out over him and rests heavily on his lower abdomen. "This is better," she says at last. "Some of my desire is satisfied...and yet there's still more. Archer."

He moans weakly. "Saber..."

"I still have this hunger." She grinds against him again and he spasms a little at the sensation of her walls slick and tight around his shaft, those strange eggs pulsing around the head of his cock. But she continues, "Give me a knife."

He doesn't know how he has the energy left for it, but somehow he reaches out and hands her a slender dagger. "Will you eat me now?"

"Yes," she says. "I can't resist, and I have no reason to in any case." She studies the knife for a moment. "I'll leave your limbs so these—" She pats her belly. "—can eat when I bear them. But I'll eat your insides."

"That's fine," he begins, but by then it's too late. She rests the tip of the blade just below his solar plexus, grasps the hilt, and sinks it deep into him.

The metal plunges neatly through his flesh. He gasps wetly and feels the muscles of his stomach heave helplessly against the steel buried in them now. Blood bubbles up past his lips. "That's—a start," he says.

She reaches out and touches his bloody mouth, then lifts her stained fingers up to her face to lick them. "Only a start," she agrees, and she grips the hilt of the dagger once more. Firmly, she draws it down his body, the sharp blade cleanly ripping open his whole belly as she goes. She doesn't stop until she's sliced him open from sternum to pelvis, right above where his cock disappears into her cunt. Midway there, she reaches down with one hand to lift her own belly out of the way.

He shudders and rocks his hips against her, watching with dazed eyes as blood gushes out of his body. He can feel his insides opening and unraveling. "Keep going," he urges her.

"I do not need your permission," she says. Her voice is cold, though her cunt is still very hot against his hard and straining cock deep within her. She twists the blade inside his flesh, and he moans desperately as she begins to cut away the skin and muscles above. The pain is almost irrelevant to him—it's an impossible joy to be torn apart by her.

Within minutes, all his entrails are open to the air above them—some organs already torn by the knife, others still intact. Her swollen belly is now stained with blood as it rests atop his open guts.

Saber lifts the chunks of raw meat she sliced away from him to her mouth and begins to eat. Dizzily, he watches her teeth sink into his own flesh, and he moans with agonized pleasure as she consumes him, ripping away and swallowing pieces of muscle. Even as she eats, she grinds against him. He can feel things growing inside the eggs as they rub stickily against his cock, but he cannot think of how to describe the sensation of them.

Saber swallows a bite of him and frowns. "Your meat is tough," she says in tones of damning judgment. "But still, it is a pleasure to consume you, Archer. To devour what I was fool enough to try to protect."

He groans. "You were never—" It's hard to speak right now around all the sensation radiating through him, around the blood filling up his mouth.

"Don't delude yourself," she says between bites.

Finally, she swallows the last of the meat she sliced off his belly, and her attention turns to what still lies within him. She reaches down to stroke his internal organs with strong, slim fingers. "I will give you a choice," Saber says, her eyes still flat and gold. "What should I eat first? Answer quickly—I still hunger."

He groans again and shifts his weight a little. His entrails press against her caressing fingers and her bulging belly. "I can't...I can't decide a thing like that. I want—" What does he want? "I want you to eat all of it."

She makes a contemptuous noise at that and leans further forward. He feels his cock drive deeper into her cunt as her ass grinds down on his hips, its walls gripping slickly around his shaft, and her heavy stomach pushes into his exposed guts. "I shouldn't have trusted you to make that decision, Archer."

Above her massive belly, her newly plump breasts bob lightly with her rough breaths, now spattered with gore. "Then let me pleasure you first," he says, and he pushes himself up on his elbows just as much as she'll let him, feeling his organs slide around in the process. Her stomach pushes into the space beneath his ribs, jostling his organs aside. He moans a little at the feeling, then dips his head to her chest to pull one nipple into his mouth.

Her warm firm flesh fills the space between his lips, and he sucks at it, then bites at the nipple, first lightly and then harder. He moans, muffled, into her skin and shifts his weight again so he can grasp her hips, still slender despite the huge burden in her womb. Then he begins to move her up and down on his cock.

She squirms against him. "Careful—" She makes a desperate sound, rawer than he's ever heard from her, and grasps the vast bulge of her stomach helplessly. "I am so full."

He hums his agreement into the skin of her breast filling his mouth, and he sucks harder and moves her faster. Her inner walls drag against his shaft, wet and tight.

She twists and she shudders, and her hips begin to tremble and buck in his hands. He feels her belly pushing up against his spine, deep inside his gory abdomen. "Nnnh—" He grinds her against him, rocking his own hips to push himself impossibly deep into her cunt. "Archer! How dare you make me climax so soon! How dare you—"

With a huge shudder and a long moan, she comes, her cunt clenching tight around his shaft. Overwhelmed, he at last lets go of her and falls back to the ground. He can see now that her entire lower torso is covered in his blood and gore, and he can still feel the sticky eggs that fill her womb pushing against the head of his cock, the things inside them pulsing larger and larger.

Above him, Saber's satisfied moan trails off into a small noise of horror. When she opens her eyes again, they are green once more. "Archer...?!"

"Saber," he murmurs. "Keep eating." His guts are a soupy mass filling up his open belly now, other already-damaged organs mixed in with them.

She shakes her head mutely, her eyes distraught with guilt.

"You're hungry," he says.

"It's true," she says. "This brood demands to be fed. But—I cannot—" She shudders around him, then, and reflexively grinds herself down on his cock another time. The gesture seems to remind her of how far she's already come, because she lowers her gaze in despair. "They're starting to hatch inside me. Forgive me, Shirou!"

With no further warning, she buries her small hands in the mess of his entrails, and she curls her fingers around his guts and starts to yank them out of his belly. He feels more of them rip and tear out of him.

She shoves them into her mouth and frantically chews and swallows.

He moans and spasms helplessly against her at the feeling of her teeth tearing into his intestines. His cock slides in and out of her as she thrusts herself up and down upon it. He can feel the truth of her last desperate words with each thrust—unnameable _things_ now poke their way out of their eggs to squirm and grope at the head of his cock with wet mouths and oozing tentacles.

She continues to eat him desperately, finishing his intestines and now reaching for the rest of his organs. Gasping with mingled horror and pleasure the whole time, she chews and swallows his entire liver bit by bit. Inside her womb, something winds a long rough tongue around the head of his cock and caresses it.

On the brink of orgasm, he feels her grasp his lowermost ribs, one in each hand, and break them away from his body, flesh and all. His body jerks at the crack of bone, his hips rocking in response, his cock driving deeper into her.

He cries out and comes at last as she frantically tears the meat off his detached ribs with her teeth, her cunt squeezing tight around his shaft, slick and awful things groping at the head of his cock. A moment later, he feels her shuddering helplessly with her own release.

Archer lies there beneath her dazed and gutted and momentarily content. "Saber..." The word escapes him as little more than a sigh.

She does not look at him; she turns her head away in shame, her gaze lowered.

Weakly, he reaches up to touch her face, stained as it is with his blood. "I'm glad," he says.

She stiffens a little in shock and pulls back from his body; his cock slowly slides out of her. "Archer?"

"I always thought my body was a meaningless, useless thing," he says. "It was a tool I could use to accomplish my goals, that's all. But with it, I sated and satisfied my king."

She does look at him now, her cheeks flushed beneath the gore on them, her eyes wide with surprise. Then she says, "I understand—your tribute is valuable to me."

"Oh?" He summons up a smirk. "Is that your way of saying you enjoyed it?"

"I—" Whatever her reaction to that would have been is quickly lost. Her eyes widen suddenly, and she groans and grasps her bulging belly as she falls back on her ass, her legs spread before her. "No!"

"Saber?" He tries to straighten up a little in alarm, only to realize that with his abdominal muscles gone, it's no longer an option. Instead, he pushes himself up on his elbows and rolls to his knees that way, wincing slightly at the empty feeling where everything between his pelvis and his ribcage used to be. A little more gore splashes out of it as he moves.

She moans again. "They're emerging," she says. "I don't understand."

"It was inevitable," he says. "I failed to defend you, and your body was distorted and parasitized, so—"

"Not that," she says, adding, "I have suffered violations before, Archer," though he's never seen her eyes so full of despair. "But the things I can feel crawling out of my womb now...they are not merely spider-beasts. They are everything monstrous I can imagine."

"That's impossible," he begins, but then they have more pressing concerns.

Saber spasms helplessly on the ground before him and clutches at her belly. "They're coming out," she says. She squirms a little and spreads her legs wider.

He doesn't know what to do, so all he does is take hold of her slender shoulders, pull her close, and start to stroke her hair.

"Archer?" She blinks. "There is no need to comfort me, not after what I have done to you." Her voice is strained. He catches a glimpse of something slick and dark starting to push out of her cunt.

"It doesn't matter," he says, and he tenderly kisses her forehead. "You will find a way to defeat Caster and her brood, Saber. You are the strongest Servant."

"I have—" She groans and rocks her hips, trying to birth the things within her. "I have mothered them as well, so they are my responsibility."

A serpentine thing begins to emerge from her cunt, and then another; something many-tentacled and bizarre begins to pull itself out of her. She cries out as the entire beast, an infant hydra, slides fully out of her. The creatures inside her give her no time to rest after that; something else begins to claw its way out of her womb and through her cunt.

Overwhelmed, she grasps his shoulders and buries her face in the crook of his neck. He holds her and strokes her hair as she gives birth to the monsters; she shudders and groans as each one pushes its way out of her. In the end, eight of the creatures crawl on the cave floor before them, some tentacled, some clawed, some scaled and some furred.

Saber gasps again. "That is all of them," she says, though her belly and breasts are still slightly swollen. She pulls away from him and pushes herself up on her knees. "I will not allow them to feed!"

But Archer shakes his head. "They'll emerge from this cavern and prey on humans if you don't sacrifice me," he says. "Naturally, it's better this way—"

He barely has time to finish speaking before the beasts swarm past Saber and are upon him. It happens almost too fast for him to feel it. Their sharp teeth sink into the flesh of his legs and arms and tear away the meat they find. An instant later he hears bones cracking and grinding and feels them shatter while still attached to him.

"Archer!" Saber is on her feet again at last, still naked and covered in gore, but managing to call her sword to her hand. But she hesitates, then: as the monsters gorge themselves on his flesh, it's impossible for her to aim a blow at them that won't hit him as well.

In barely a minute, it's over anyway. The creatures eat their fill and then retreat into the shadows. Saber spins around to try to follow them, but they skitter off in all different directions, and more than that, she clearly cannot bring herself to abandon Archer like this.

He sighs. "Saber...your concern for me is ridiculous."

She looks down at him in mute distress where he lies. His limbs are gone now, save for jagged bits of bone sticking out of the sockets of his arms and legs. He tries to shift position a little and finds it an impossibility.

"Well," he says, "I suppose I'll disappear soon enough, but let me take these last moments to assure you, you bear no guilt for those creatures and will do a fine job of destroying them. Saber—"

"Quiet, Archer," she snaps, anger suddenly flashing in her eyes.

"What?" It seems unfair that she'd say that now. These are obviously his last words to her this time around.

But instead of allowing him a noble speech, she reaches down, grabs him by the head, and lifts the remains of his body. "Your Master still has command seals—isn't that true?"

Bemused, Archer says, "Yes, but—"

"One will be enough," she says, taking him by the shoulders now and lifting him to face her, "to order you to regenerate."

Something flips over inside the void where his guts used to be. He stares at her in surprise as she holds him, dripping with his blood and gore.

"You really are still a fool," she says. "You will come with me on our quest to defeat these beasts, Archer. This brood of Arachne's—if that's truly who she is. I will not let this be your end."

He sighs, then. "Very well," he says. "I suppose I can spare the time to save the world from monsters."

Her eyes narrow. "For once," she says, "this isn't merely about saving the world. My darkness is not gone, Archer. I will have my revenge for how she treated us."

Something chills inside him at her words, and even now, he smiles. "Then it's settled, Saber. We'll be partners once more, no matter what our Masters say."

He catches a glimpse of her own smile before she gathers him to her chest and starts for the exit of the cavern. Some kind of twisted adventure yet awaits them both, and he almost finds himself looking forward to it.


End file.
